Poll: Will you ACTUALLY be playing Dark Souls 2 easy mode? (if there is one)

[lucky_sharm]

I would.

I've heard good things about Dark Souls combat and bosses.
But from what I've heard if you die you have to do the whole section over again. That's a deal-breaker for me.

Not true. Bonfires serve as checkpoints in the game, and there are several of them scattered throughout different parts of the world. Some aren't even a minute apart from eachother.

 

[The Almighty Aardvark]

FUCK NO! I fought tooth and nail to finish Dark Souls multiple times, there is no way I'm giving that up.

this

does not make any sense....at all *sigh* seriously people

I'm surprised that doesn't make any sense. You don't understand how someone can consider the difficulty of a game a big part of their experience with it? There's no way I'm touching easy mode either. I enjoyed the struggle to beat Dark Souls immensely (occasionally in between hating it), it just wouldn't be as fun without it.

People who want to play it on easy mode? Power to you, have fun. I'll just be quietly considering you a wimp

 

[JagermanXcell]

No, not touching it with a 39 in a 1/2 foot pole(highly doubt there will be one anyways). Because what makes Dark Souls unique is the difficulty. Add an easy mode, and congratulations:
You end up caving into the system of pandering, lose fans, and look like fools for destroying one of the core mechanics of the series. I've lost too many good games because of this. T_T

OT: Why don't people just use the wikis/the internet in general? There a plenty of veterans who take the time out of their days to make videos and guides to help you face the Souls series. Its kind of a slap in the face to all their hard work to add an "easy mode". Also if you want easy, why did you buy a game whose franchise is notorious for its difficulty?

 

[chadachada123]

As some of us have discussed before, I still maintain the notion that making Dark Souls easy, more accessible and more mainstream would actually mean a departure from its yay difficult very nature. You know, the core bit. The soul of the game. The bit that makes up quite a bit of the real estate that is the gaming wonderland of Dark Souls?

Because, as it is, it ain't that difficult once you've wrapped your head around it. See enemies from afar. Expect enemies around every corner. Move slowly, or try running once you know, or believe you know there to be a safer or safer spot to run to. Try not to get cornered by one enemy, try not to get cornered by a gang of half dozen enemies.

That sounds pretty simple, does it not? At least it seems simple enough to me.

Think Evil Dead or any horror flick that comes to mind. Be open, be ready, be wary, be scared. Expect anything. Expect the unexpected. Expect to get killed, at least once. Expect tress to attack you, be glad if they don't. The shrubbery is evil. Try something, it might work. If it won't, it might kill you. Try again. Something, you know, different. No dice? Try walking around it, then. Come back later. Imminent death might be less of a threat once you actually know what it is you're doing.

Things that shine from afar are certainly there to attract your attention, but don't expect them to invite you over for tea. Things that seem close might involve hours of scouting for the uninitiated and a five minute walk in the park for the New Game Plus adepts and masters.

It's just that kind of game. Think Pac Man.

It' also not the kind of game that really needs more exposition in intravenous dosages of FMV or QTE nonsense. When you run, you run and it usually matters and you normally have a reason for running around, even though it gets you the most attention of everyone and everything around. When you're sneaking and moving really, really slowly, you normally have good reasons to do so. Every new location you discover is well prepared to blow your mind, one way or another. Find the saddest yet loveliest beach to hang out on, steering clear of killer cockles and mussles! Find the most important hat tip to architecture shouting "I LOVE YOU!" in a modern game to date, come see Anor Londo. It also comes without friendly daylight for the emo and satanist bunch. Come meet foes small and large, come chop off their tails! Now, ain't that grand and spliffy all by itself? And that's just the tour guide headlines off the top of me silly head.

Don't make the tutorial any longer than the Asylum escape intro scene. Any longer than that, and we're catering to the Harry Potter target audience, and they're, what, 5 years old on average.

(badum-tish)

This sums my thoughts up pretty well.

I'm not worried about having a mode that less-adept players can get into. I'm worried about poor implementation of this mode and of people not enjoying the game as much because of poor implementation, because they aren't pressured/rewarded the way standard-mode players are. I'm also worried about people switching to an easier difficulty because they don't understand that death is supposed to happen, and even more, that the death was their fault and that they need to learn what to do to avoid it next time instead of just giving up.

Actually, if FROM included an easy mode but made it EXTREMELY clear that this easy mode might not have the same learning/experience, and that if it becomes boring at any point then it's time to move to normal difficulty, then I'd call it appropriate.

 

[skywolfblue]

I would.

I've heard good things about Dark Souls combat and bosses.
But from what I've heard if you die you have to do the whole section over again. That's a deal-breaker for me.

Not true. Bonfires serve as checkpoints in the game, and there are several of them scattered throughout different parts of the world. Some aren't even a minute apart from eachother.

But aren't they rather rare? That is what I was told.

http://darksouls.wikidot.com/bonfires

^ seems to indicate that there is usually only 1 or two bonfires per area. Are they reasonably spaced (<5min) without taking any shortcuts?

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

I would.

I've heard good things about Dark Souls combat and bosses.
But from what I've heard if you die you have to do the whole section over again. That's a deal-breaker for me.

Not true. Bonfires serve as checkpoints in the game, and there are several of them scattered throughout different parts of the world. Some aren't even a minute apart from eachother.

But aren't they rather rare? That is what I was told.

http://darksouls.wikidot.com/bonfires

^ seems to indicate that there is usually only 1 or two bonfires per area. Are they reasonably spaced (<5min) without taking any shortcuts?

That's the beauty of it: If you make it to, say, bonfire #2 in any given area, you can activate it and if you decide to rest your aching bones there, it will be the one spot you'll 'spawn' from. If you decide that, in case of death expected or unexpected, you want to continue your little stroll and tumble through wicked wonderland from this newest, latest and closest bonfire (aka checkpoint/spawn point/base/flag/vita-chamber), then just simply do as you please, kind sir, woman or beast! If, however, you don't like it here, just die already and go back instantly whence you came from!

And then there's even such a thing as a Homeward Bone. Ooh how you would love to know about those.

The bit about having to do 'a whole section again' when failure grabs you by the spine and sucks your sweet meat off of it might very well be true, but you can still decide to change your stance, your approach, your strategy at any given point in time. Once you find a walk of (gaming) life that suits you well, stick to it. It might carry you all the way to the very end boss, or at least the next couple of hours of play time ahead of you. I know of people who have finished the game without ever caring about, say, parry-riposte. I myself decided in the wonderful poshness of the Anor Londo interiours that parry-riposte would just be such a godsend, my personal little fast-forward button, that I singled out some lonely silver knight and went into Inigo Montoya mode, dying quite a few times before I perfected the parry-riposte timing, learned the full move set of the silver knights and cut down the time to cut down silver knights by an average 95%.

As to your question: If you don't kill anything, you don't get no points/cash/souls/mushrooms, so there is absolutely nothing to lose when you die (in the 'easy' Dark Souls, that is). Bear in mind that dying did have consequences in the first title of the series, Demon's Souls.

So, in a way, Dark Souls was already a new iteration of Demon's Souls with a number of facilitations installed, or some wads of hair and insects removes from your gaming soup.

Once you reach most Bonfires, you'll be able to speed things up considerably anyway. But even before that, reaching a number of bonfire #2s usually means you'll find/activate a shortcut or you'll see that jumping here, walking there, dropping there could actually be your homemade shortcut because you just figured it out yourself.

Oh, and most 'levels' or areas are actually puzzles and mazes themselves, and they would take up but an amazingly tiny footprint from a square mile approach to things.

One level feels like being thrown into a surprise Takeshi's Castle alternate reality, and I had an absolute blast. There's not many games or, say, films that could pull something like this off. Dark Souls did it, with grace, a cheeky smile and just a little nibble at your 'nads.

Brilliant, brilliant game.

 

[Vault101]

I'm surprised that doesn't make any sense. You don't understand how someone can consider the difficulty of a game a big part of their experience with it? There's no way I'm touching easy mode either. I enjoyed the struggle to beat Dark Souls immensely (occasionally in between hating it), it just wouldn't be as fun without it.

People who want to play it on easy mode? Power to you, have fun. I'll just be quietly considering you a wimp

an easy mode that does not affect the core game TAKES NOTHING AWAY FROM HIM....

also wimps? seriously? there could be other reasons..like like of time or whatever

call people wimps for not wanting to do somthing risky, not for not wanting to play a game

 

[Vault101]

Applause!
You finally get it!
Time wasted is time wasted.
Like this tedious argument.

if the developers want to do it then its up to them, I'm not saying all games have to apeal to everyone

[quote/]
Pointless and tedious... just like most of your arguments. Sigh... didn't I tell you to stop responding to me?
There's plenty of bitching. Quit being selectively blind. [/quote]
just saying something is isn't an answer...I need examples if I ma to understand your definition of bitching

Wasted resources affect all fans of the series.

would a different setting really effect the core game? we don't even know because said game and said mode don;t exist yet

[quote/]
Tedious...[/quote]
oh whoop-de-fucking do...I am ever so sorry

[quote/]I quote:"I'm not "instant gratification" whore..it actually annoys me somtimes how easy some games (assasins creed) are I'm not a gaming machoist eather". (masochist either)[/quote]
I didn't admit to being a instant gratification whore...or admit to most gamers being that way...

What part of "did this strike too close to home" become "you prove me right by disagreeing"

its essentially saying "oh you take issue with me saying modern gamers are instant gratification whores? that gives me the impression you ARE one"


[quote/]You needed it explained to you, since you obviously didn't get it.
If you had gotten it in the first place, I wouldn't have had to explain it to you.
I explained it.[/quote]
I understood it perfectly fine, Its just one of those things that annoys the fuck out of me because it makes for a bad argument

 

[Vault101]

You are without a doubt the most tedious person here.

why thankyou!
[quote/]You've added nothing to the discussion. Not one thing.
That entire last post was pointless.
You misunderstand even the simplest things.[/quote]
on the contrary I'm only arguing that an "easy" mode is not the worst thing ever...and aside from that now I'm just arguing over annoying things people do in arguments, I don'y believe I misunderstood anything

[quote/]Basically you are here to argue for arguments sake.
It's no wonder your forum health meter is where it is.[/quote]
no....I'm here to argue that when people say "oh you reacted to some things I said...that means you are the things I said" its really annoying and about as useful as anecdotal evidence
[quote/]Go away.[/quote]
if you really meant that you wouldn't be replying to me

 

[Fractral]

snip

I guess thats just a difference in opinions then. I don't really get much pleasure from beating other people, preferring to take my enjoyment from the game itself, although I can understand how you feel about it.

 

[The White Hunter]

It would be hilarious if Dark Souls 2 came with two difficulty modes: hilariously easy and brutally, brutally hard. I want easy to be so easy that it takes the fun out of playing on easy.

I want thm to pull a dick move like old games did and not let you get morew than halfway in on Easy.

OT: Nah, probably not, I play standard/normal as default anyway on everything.

Oooh. OOOOooohhh. Oh I like this idea. This would be fucking awesome in multiple ways. It would both ACTUALLY be useful to people learning the game (Good enough to play it on Easy? Great! Now you get to start over and play it how it is meant to be played!), AND would be a freaking hilarious way to address the whole "accessibility" crowd.

OT: I don't really like the poll question and its lack of options. I would *try* an easy mode if Dark Souls 2 has one, but it would not be my main account and I wouldn't be "seriously" playing it, just playing it to check out differences and seeing if I could, say, speed-run it or something.

I thought of it after watching the Castlevania 64 episode of Let's GET!!! over on retrowaretv, seems to me like it'd suit Dark Souls just fine to be like "Yeah well you managed on easy now DO IT AGAIN ON HARD!"

I'd also try out of curiosity. Tbh little things would make it a more accessible experience: a map, vague directions, a map, more checkpoints. I've always said the games aren't hard, it's just that they punsih you A LOT for dying.

 

[viranimus]

no one is upset they can't play darksouls
I actually don't really care that dark souls was too hard for me...whatever and I don;t care if the next darksouls comes out being the same...however if there was an easy mode I might actually be interested,

And there it is. For all this righteous indignation, tossing around ePeens and elitism it all boils down to little more than the common scene of someone screaming that the law is unjust as they are being taken to jail for breaking said law. Now clearly you do care or else you would not have put forth this much effort in to trying to defend a self motivated position and trying to hide it under the false guise of being tolerant.

I am going to try reason once again. I presented this scenario in hypothetical to a friend of mine to which instantly they called out and reminded me of another situation that perfectly mirrors this.

Metallica and the Black Album.

Spoiler

In the late 80s Metallica was a leading force in an up and coming musical movement. Thrash metal. They with other bands formed the musical scene and the movement. They were essentially viewed as kings within this movement mostly on the strength of touring schedules, live events and the way the band was able to reach out and connect with their fans through their music. Fans made deep connection to the band through that relatability and in turn further strengthened the band by adamantly supporting the band rabidly, especially in the form of live shows. Then In 1988 the band was rewarded with its first taste of mainstream success off the strength of the video for the song "One" off the "And justice for all" Album. Fans even ate up that success almost to the point of using "One" to point to for the uninitiated to say "See how awesome this is?"

Then in 1991 they released their self entitled "Black" album. It was a massive mainstream success bridging the gap between thrash metal's abrasive nature and the more radio/video friendly mainstream audience by reducing complexity, slowing tempo and other techniques to create more accessible tracks and ready for distribution singles. However, with that mainstream success it was immediately apparent to many long standing fans of the bands work that on essentially ever relevant level the black album was a vastly inferior offering. Many fans displeased with this fundamental change of the band started the outcry of "Sellout" To which Metallica notably owned when Jason Newstead responded "Sellout, Yea, every show every where we go" in little more than a mockery of upset fans resenting the elimination of what drew them to the band and gave them years of support.

Nothing stopped long time fans from enjoying the black album. Despite its refined technical mechanics and streamlined writing for broader appeal, there was technically nothing that stopped those fans from listening. It was what it created that prevented long time fans from enjoying it. That schism bred resentment. It was not a simple matter of the albums merit or lack their of. It was fostered, when the more socially out casted type who had been a long time Metallica supporter, even long before Cliff Burtons death, were bombarded with drones of uninitiated "prep" "Jock" "fans" professing their support for the band, with wearing band T-shirts bought at the mall, never once having set foot in one of their live shows. To them these new fans had no clue what the band had been about, its history, its suffering and struggles. All they really knew was what they could turn on MTV and see "Enter sandman" "Unforgiven" and "Nothing else matters" repeatedly streamed thru the tiny shrinking windows of time MTV still played music.

Removing the depth and complexity that initially drew fans to the band in order to pander to a wider main stream audience with simpler and technically lazier "singles" pumping out merchandise out of every orifice that it could be pushed was an action impossible to see as anything other than an indignant slap in the face to those original fans. The band no longer made the type of music the original fans gravitated to. Instead choosing to "upgrade" their fan base by exchanging one dedicated and loyal group for another much larger one.

In the consequent years that followed we saw Metallica push the boundary of basically shitting on everything that got them to where they were. After "trading up" to the main stream fanbase, they cowardly tried to jump ship again when metal had been supplanted by Alternative in main stream popularity in the late 90s in order to cling to that mainstream success. In the process all that was accomplished was alienating all those fair weather "mainstream fans" they had gained with the Black album and rightly being dismissed as posers by the alternative crowd they were trying to appeal to with 1996's "Load" album and consequent offerings afterward.

In all this time the band consistently grew fan anger and resentment like crops. The band, while still making money, wallowed in mediocrity as a band with a gun shy base, repeatedly scorned abused and neglected. Through years of failed "experiments" and lineup changes trying to create something that would make people like them again, it wasn't until the band gave up and revisited their roots with 2008's Death Magnetic that popular opinion of the band was swayed favorably once again, and it only took 17 to two decades of trying to tell people what they wanted that they were able to actually give them what they wanted which simply was a glimmer of the band that they had long ago fell in love with that they reasonably thought had been lost forever.

Before I sum this up, I wanted to address one specific point you made, because you answered it yourself.

my idea for a perfect souls game... is one that even I cannot beat
"May all your desires be fulfilled except for one, so you'll always have something to strive for."- 7of9

well then what's the point of that? do you also like to drive nails into your hands for fun?

if a game is too easy then there is no challenge..no challenge it gets boring

So now, lets review this whole debacle. The question was. Would you play DS2 with easy mode. To which I responded NO, I would not because I would take adding easy mode as a slap in the face for supporting the franchise between it and Demons and I would cease my support of it because of that. I explained what it would take for me to personally forgive such a grievous sleight. Then the discussion became about spinning having pride and sense of accomplishment into being exclusionary and elitist. I try to illustrate why there are positives to having challenges that ARE beyond others abilities, and how giving everyone a trophy for "participation" does in fact negate my personal ability to derive a portion of satisfaction from the game, as well as hurts those developmentally who would want an EM. To which it was again spun as invalid for not having a technical basis, even though it does in fact apply on a technical and mechanical levels as well. In short this whole argument has been about nothing but trying to spin away the reasoning for a position as somehow invalid. And the question simply is Why? Because feelings are hurt for being on the outside looking in?

Ill further simplify this. You, by your own admission accept that

I'm still not getting it I'm afraid

But persist in trying to defend your inability to "get it" as being correct, despite the fact in my absence it has been repeatedly explained to you and approached on many different ways. So I think you need to accept what you said and understand that the failing is in your ability to comprehend it, not in the reasoning for it. If you dont get it, that is fine, but dont you see the problem with dismissing those who do?

 

[sXeth]

If easy modes just health adjustments probably not. If it gets rid of irritating gimmicks like the one (of many) underground zone with inexplicable darkness, sure.

I'm more interested in how they're gonna lay out the story all in all, as to whether I can be bothered slogging through it again. (And don't tie covenants to non-optional bosses, lol. All hauil Gravelord Hi--- oh wait, I just offed him)

 

[Dandark]

It would take all the fun out of playing it. I still haven't finished Dark souls but I would not use an easy mode even if there was one. The whole point of playing Dark souls is because of it's soul crushing difficulty.

 

[infinity_turtles]

I'm going to wait on buying Dark Souls 2 due to the information coming out about it being concerning, but if I do get it and it has such a mode I'll play on Easy because not doing so seems stupid to me. Said it in a bunch of threads already, but the thing is pretty much always just a static debuff, making it very clearly the tactically superior choice. It'll probably ruin the challenge, but if I'm not doing my damnedest to succeed I'm not enjoying the challenge anyway.

 

[Vault101]

.... under the false guise of being tolerant.

tolerance has nothing to do with it, I really just don;t unterstand how a different mode for gameplay ruins YOUR enjoyment of the game. Aside from the fact his is a game/mode that does not exist yet if it did not affect you on an actual GAMEPLAY level then really all it hurts is how you think the game should be played and the fact that people arent "doing it properly"

[quote/]I am going to try reason once again. I presented this scenario in hypothetical to a friend of mine to which instantly they called out and reminded me of another situation that perfectly mirrors this.
[/quote]
I understand the concept of things becoming worse in an effort to reach wider audiences..HOWEVER your metallica example falls flat for me because when metallica supposedly changed their sound [i/]that was the sound everyone got[/i] it doesnt fit this videogame example because not everyone gets the same game, you don't get their difficulty level and they don't get yours

like if (hypothetically) metallca put out an album that contained 2 CD's...one was "metalica lite" the watered down mainstream and the other was "full metalica" for the core fans....if we accept the CD's are actually the same trackwise excpet for those differneces then it makes no fucking difference aside from some "fans" complaining about the "posers" enjoying the crappyer metallica

and to go off topic for a moment but "fans" arent always gospel...oh sure they know why a thing is good and suport it but can also (as a collective) act like idiots and have a real aversion to anything "different" and might spit in the face of somthing good because its not their precious x, like I think Thousand Suns by linkin Park was actually really good..anyway I'm not applying that statment to metallica because I know nothing about them


[quote/] my idea for a perfect souls game... is one that even I cannot beat
"May all your desires be fulfilled except for one, so you'll always have something to strive for."- 7of9

well then what's the point of that? do you also like to drive nails into your hands for fun?[/quote]

if a game is too easy then there is no challenge..no challenge it gets boring

part of challenge is [b/]acomplishing somthing[/b] as in finishing the game, if theres no accomplishment you just keep going untill the frustration becomes too much

[quote/]So now, lets review this whole debacle. The question was. Would you play DS2 with easy mode. To which I responded NO, I would not because I would take adding easy mode as a slap in the face for supporting the franchise between it and Demons and I would cease my support of it because of that.[/quote]
don't want the other kids to play with your toys so you yell at mummy and daddy

you STILL have not convinced me it affects you in anyway


[quote/]I explained what it would take for me to personally forgive such a grievous sleight. Then the discussion became about spinning having pride and sense of accomplishment into being exclusionary and elitist.[/quote]
HOW IS IT NOT? if you specifically say "people being able to play at a lower difficulty takes away my pride and sense of accomplishment"

[quote/]I try to illustrate why there are positives to having challenges that ARE beyond others abilities, and how giving everyone a trophy for "participation" does in fact negate my personal ability to derive a portion of satisfaction
from the game, as well as hurts those developmentally who would want an EM.[/quote]
trophy for participation? what is this...a fucking game or an actual REAL achievement? like school or sports?

yeah I get it.....if I were to be able play it on a lower difficulty you wouldn't like that, something I am having serious trouble wrapping my head around

honestly the only way I can see this affect you is that you have to add a couple of extra words to your bragging "I beat Dark souls [b/]on hard[/b]" <-that must be so difficult for you

[quote/]To which it was again spun as invalid for not having a technical basis, even though it does in fact apply on a technical and mechanical levels as well.[/quote]
we don;t know that for sure because neither the mode or game exist yet